Practitioners are calling for higher academic standards in traditional Chinese medicine and acupuncture in the Republic, reports Sylvia Thompson
KNOWLEDGE OF the 5,000-year-old traditional Chinese medicine will be strengthened in the Republic in the next few years, if a Dublin-based Shanghai-born doctor has her way.
Dr Su Pin Chen, who runs the Shanghai Acupuncture College Ireland in Dublin, is one of a number of teachers who want to establish higher academic standards for traditional Chinese medicine and acupuncture in the Republic.
And last week, she brought a group of doctors from Shanghai to meet Department of Health officials with the aim of setting up a degree course in acupuncture.
"We want to bring more knowledge of traditional Chinese medicine to this part of the world. Acupuncture has been in Ireland for about 20 years but most practitioners only have diplomas in acupuncture. In China, we must study for five years as a doctor before we practise acupuncture," she says.
Dr Su Pin Chen was trained in Shanghai both in conventional Western medicine and traditional Chinese medicine (TCM). In many hospitals throughout China, TCM is integrated with conventional Western medicine and treatment choices are made according to the illness of the patient.
"About 85 per cent of people receive TCM as well as Western medicine in China," explains Dr Su Pin Chen. "Most doctors in China are trained in both Western medicine and TCM and can give prescriptions in both systems," she says.
There is also a state system of registration for doctors who practise TCM in China.
In Ireland, Dr Su Pin Chen believes the growth of interest in acupuncture in particular is because people are searching for alternatives to pharmaceutical drugs.
"People want to take fewer drugs and they also want to look after their bodies more," she says. "The philosophy of TCM is all about restoring balance to the body."
In their diagnosis, TCM doctors also rely a lot on clinical examination, family history and lifestyle factors.
Generally speaking, the Chinese take a more preventative approach to illness and many people in China go for an annual check-up - hence the concept of Chinese people paying their doctors to keep well rather than paying their doctors when they are sick.
Even Dr Su Pin Chen - who has been living in Ireland for 20 years - returns to Shanghai every year for a medical check-up. "Preventing illness is part of our culture," she explains. "When I'm back in Shanghai, I make an appointment one day in advance and then I go to the clinic where I see up to 10 doctors over one and a half hours.
"In that time, I have everything checked out and have scans, tests for cholesterol, etc," she explains.
According to Dr Su Pin Chen, the preventative model of healthcare also exists in family life in China.
"We're told as children to take certain herbs before the winter and then lots of fruits like water melon in the summer. Taking a ginger drink before your periods is also common knowledge in China," she explains.
Prof Wu Yao Chi, director of the Acupuncture department at the Shanghai 6th People's Hospital, was one of the visiting doctors. "We see about 250 patients a day in our clinic," he says. "And depending on their condition, we decide to treat with TCM, TCM and Western medicine or Western medicine alone," he explains.
As director of study at the Shanghai Acupuncture College Ireland, Prof Wu already has links here and also lectures in France and Switzerland.
The Shanghai Acupuncture College Ireland currently offers part-time and full-time diplomas in acupuncture in association with the Shanghai 6th hospital which is affiliated to the Jiao Tong University.
Students on these courses spend some time at the Shanghai 6th hospital as part of their training. The Chinese delegation who visited Dublin last week would like to set up a degree course, taught at Shanghai Acupuncture College Ireland by visiting doctors from the Shanghai 6th hospital.
The Irish Institute of Chinese Medicine in Dublin is also keen to establish a degree course in TCM and acupuncture in Ireland.
"We have gone through the entire Higher Education and Training Awards Council [HETAC] for a Bachelor of Science in traditional Chinese medicine/acupuncture and we are awaiting their decision," explains Bernadette Ward, director of the Irish Institute of Chinese Medicine which is linked to Nanjing University of Chinese Medicine.
According to Ward, the Chinese government is now encouraging Chinese universities to secure their co-operative links with TCM colleges around the world. "In November 2005, we co-hosted a visit to Ireland by She Jing, the Chinese vice-minister for health," she adds.
Training standards
The Acupuncture College Council was set up this year to improve the standards of teaching acupuncture and traditional Chinese medicine (TCM) in Ireland.
Bernadette Ward, director of the Irish Institute of Chinese Medicine, was a founding member of the Acupuncture College Council. "You don't need a degree to practise acupuncture but we want to upgrade professional training in Ireland so that courses here can be benchmarked against courses in Britain, the United States, Canada and Australia," she explains.
The Acupuncture College Council, which aims to launch a website before the end of the year, currently has four colleges on board. These include the Irish Institute of Chinese Medicine which has about 100 students enrolled each year across all its courses and the Shanghai Acupuncture College Ireland which has about 10 students enrolled each year.
Currently, in Ireland, acupuncturists and practitioners of traditional Chinese medicine are self-regulated. This means that they are regulated by their own professional associations which require registered members to be insured to practice, to abide by a code of ethics and to keep up to date in their professional knowledge.
Acupuncturists and TCM practitioners are members of the Acupuncture Foundation Professional Association (www.acupro.ie) or the Acupuncture Council of Ireland (www.tcmci.ie) or The Irish Register of Chinese Herbal Medicine (www.irchm.com)